BEAM Grab the Mic webinar

Speakers:

What happens when a prescriptive approach to small and microenterprise development does not have the intended impact?

In this example, programme restructuring and re-orientation was necessary.

USAID’s Strengthening Entrepreneurship and Enterprise Development (SEED) project in Egypt works to improve employment and incomes for entrepreneurs and MSMEs. It focuses on disadvantaged groups such as youth and women. The project works Egypt-wide but most economic activity is centred in Cairo - one of the world’s largest conurbations.

When initial results did not meet expectations USAID decided that a restructure of SEED was in order. They revisited the programme logic and retrofitted an adaptive market systems approach, using the DCED Standard.

This is the first-time application of a market systems development approach to a large-scale, multi-sector project in Egypt.

Ron Ashkin and his colleagues walked through the exercise of analysing the logic and value for money of more than 60 different interventions. These include early stage entrepreneurship support to value chain linkages. They also discussed how they re-orientated the project’s technical approach to focus more effectively on outcomes and impact.